Welcome to swine flu Quarantine - Day 8 DONE

Boy, was I glad to go into the office today. It's a lovely place where everyone gets their own lunch and no one EVER says they are bored.

Kids were home with Grammy, I have no idea what they did. And I'm perfectly fine with that.

School is on tomorrow and ironically my car has acted up so I'm going to have to STAY HOME.

God has a tremendous sense of humor. Over active, if you ask me.

So, it's back to our regular life. Here's crib notes from a week before this all started (I write for the local paper, and I eventually post things here - as well as items not appropriate for a family newspaper - like "dead mommies don't talk", for example).


The Princess and the Lexington

Before Swine Flu swept through the world with a squealing panic, Mireya and I went on a Daisy Scout trip to the USS Lexington. I was a bit concerned that, given the dearth of pink on board the ship, there would be little to hold her interest.

Still she was pumped about the trip and, like her cold, her excitement was infectious.

Not only would we be visiting this floating town, we'd spend the night! In bunks! We'd be woken up by Revelrie in the morning! We'd have grub in the mess hall!

We'd literally live aboard the "blue ghost!"

It took me a few hours into the drive to realize we'd be sleeping in bunk beds, be woken up by a bugle and eat in a mess hall.

Um, I won't even eat at a regular cafeteria (it's a long story).

As my dread descended like a blue ghost, Mireya seemed oblivious to the reality of the situation. There were no princesses on battle ships. Not to mention mommies of princesses.

And as we arrived, half of this remained true. Gone was my princess and in her place was an honest to goodness WWII sailor. She couldn't wait to get aboard, focused completely on following the rules of the ship, and was thrilled by her bunk.

But most surprising – she was completely taken by the anti-aircraft guns. We spent a good 20 minutes running to her station so she could shoot down enemy aircraft.

This is the same kid that will run screaming from a spider the size of an M&M. But give her a combat scenario and she is ALL OVER IT.

I was somewhat conflicted about this development. I have always been a great admirer of the men and women of the armed forces although my cafeteria aversion kept me from considering it as a career choice. But I have grown accustomed to being with my princess/fashion designer, resigned to a lifetime of having her adjust my wardrobe to live up to her sense of style.

Where was THAT kid?

We talked about the first woman pilot to land aboard an aircraft carrier having done it on the Lexington. We toured the sick bay and the chapel. We wandered around the bridge, she slept like a rock, and loved be woken up with "music."

I'm not sure if the Navy is ready for Mireya. But I know one thing. I sure hope she doesn't decide to take up the bugle.

Welcome to swine flu Quarantine - Day 7

The end has come. I just got this email:

Based on the latest guidance today from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Comal ISD has decided to reopen all schools and offices earlier than scheduled. Everything will reopen on Thursday, May 7th at the regular time.

That means all students and staff are expected to report to work and school on Thursday this week. If you are sick or become sick with the flu you must stay home for at least 7 days from the onset of the flu.

If you still want a packet of school work you still can pick one up from 10 am to 3 pm on Wednesday from Central Office, the Bulverde/Spring Branch Library, or the CRRC in Sattler. (yeah, right. we'll be right over - NOT)

We will see you in school on Thursday.

So that's it. Done. Finito. Now the big ol' javelina is just Piglet with the sniffles.

We are conflicted, of course, because we had our eye on next Monday as the end, and the kids feel positively ROBBED. I don't feel relieved, because basically this was the end of my shift and the start of Daddy's.

(Need I mention that it ALWAYS happens this way? Enough to make a woman paranoid...)

So, wrapping up our quarantine report...

My favorite quote of the day :

Me: "Okay, we can only stay at the pool for an hour, because I forgot the sun screen and Daddy will kill me. And how terrible would that be."

Mireya, after a beat: "Well, dead mommies don't talk..."

Hmmm. Too much cable?


Accomplishments today:
Today was swimming (the pool is always closed on Mondays), Grammy time, and phase two of closet cleaning (did you know you can fill a trash can with hangers?). Two phases remain with the closet, but we are down to the tool building layer of the dig.


Next:
Planning the return to civilization. Time for some serious laundry...

Welcome to swine flu Quarantine - Day 6

Okay, it's official.

We're getting bored. (We are taking pictures of tired dogs, for gods sake)

The pool is closed today, I had to work from home, kids were happy doing a few worksheets - that's how desperate they got. Math was fun. For 15 minutes.

The first case of swine flu was confirmed in Austin today. So now that the piggy is out of the bottle (how do they get them in there?)... well, I just don't get what we're supposed to do. Can something like this be contained?

Apparently not.

Any who, we went and worked with our new horse for a while, Sierra worked with her puppy, Mireya hung out at Grammy's.

It's getting rough out here, people. But at the same time I'm not too crazy about the idea of the kids going back to school. I'm not sure that keeping them out is good for my sanity, but they aren't going to catch this thing here, that's for sure.

Okay, we might kill each other by Thursday, but no one will develop a fever.

Sigh. Maybe I just need some sleep. Dyno has the right idea...

I wrote my column on all of this, which I'll post tomorrow along with the update. . .

Welcome to swine flu Quarantine - Day 5

We stayed up way too late last night.

Well, some of us did.


I feel like we're in some weird summer preview - without the playdates.

We did some hiking (remember the doctor's note - out door spaces are probably ok), I worked with our horses (we got a new one and she needs plenty of work) and hit the pool.

Our neighbor who works at our local doc office was there, so I pumped her for info. She said they have 6 cases they are pretty sure are swine flu, but it takes 4 days to get results. It's a type A flu, so everyone who had a flu shot should be in decent shape (my grandma should be good). People are ending up in the hospital because it turns into viral pnuemonia, for which there is no cure.

You just have to survive.

She also said they expect it to get worse in the next two weeks, which makes it seem odd that kids would go back to school then. I'm not sure if I will want them to go back. Maybe we'll just homeschool it for the last 3 weeks.

But they can't stay in a box all month... They need their own kind, so to speak.

As our neighbor pointed out, there is no real quarantine. And, she said, it looks like if you are exposed to it, you are getting it.

Today the kids played with one child at the pool. Hopefully the chlorine did it's job and killed any lingering flu ness. It looked like this little girl (our neighbors daughter, so we figured she was safe) was having a birthday party. There were balloons at a nearby table and streamers, but no other kids were there. The family tried to make it festive. They were only slightly successful.

A forgotten casualty of H1N1 - the May birthday.

Here's some local news:

As a result, and to further discourage public gatherings, the city of New Braunfels closed Landa Park for what historians have said was the first time since the park was sold to the city in 1936.

Governor Rick Perry issued a statewide disaster declaration. (43 swiners in Texas, apparently)

But after the number of possible cases had risen in Comal County for three straight days, there was no jump in the number of cases on Friday. After filling up the emergency rooms all week, flu-related traffic began to slow at Christus Santa Rosa Hospital — New Braunfels.

On the bright side, I was inspired to clean up. Today we cleaned out the top shelf of a closet in the kids room and put away some Winter clothes. I need about two more weeks of this and I might make real progress around here! We might actually find order in our chaos.

Hmmm. Not sure I can handle that. The shock to my system would be too great.

Welcome to swine flu Quarantine - Day 3

Today was the day of quarantine when you start to think, "hey, people are freaking out over nothing." All the talking heads are like "those people are over reacting. It's the flu. Yesh."

Then you get an email like this:

Subject: Flu Update from Dr. Gitterle (doctor in New Braunfels, a town close to here)


After I returned from a public health meeting yesterday with community leaders
and school officials in Comal County, Heather suggested I send an update to
everyone, because what we are hearing privately from the CDC and Health
Department is so different from what you are hearing in the media. Some
of you know some or maybe all of this, but I will just list what facts I know.


- The virus is infectious for about 2 days prior to symptom onset
- Virus sheds more than 7 days after symptom onset (possibly as long as 9 days) (this is unusual)
- Since it is such a novel (new) virus, there is no "herd immunity," so the "attack rate" is very high. This is the percentage of people who come down with a virus if exposed. Almost everyone who is exposed to this virus will become infected, though not all will be symptomatc. That is much higher than seasonal flu, which averages 10-15%. The "clinical attack rate" may be around 40-50%. This is the number of people who show symptoms.. This is a huge number. It is hard to convey the seriousness of this.
- The virulence (deadliness) of this virus is as bad here as in Mexico, and there are folks on ventilators here in the US, right now. This has not been in the media, but a 23 month old near here is fighting for his life, and a pregnant woman just south of San Antonio is fighting for her life. In Mexico, these folks might have died already, but here in the US, folks are getting Tamiflu or Relenza quickly, and we have ready access to ventilators.
What this means is that within a couple of weeks, regional hospitals will likely become overwhelmed.
- Some of the kids with positive cases in Comal County had more than 70 contacts before diagnosis.
- There are 10-25 times more actual cases (not "possible" cases -- actual), than what is being reported in the media. The way they fudge on reporting this is that it takes 3 days to get the confirmatory nod from the CDC on a given viral culture, but based on epidemiological grounds, we know that there are more than 10 cases for each "confirmed" case right now.
- During the night, we crossed the threshold for the definition of a WHO, Phase 6 global pandemic. This has not happened in any of our lifetimes so far. We are in uncharted territory.
- I expect President Obama will declare an emergency sometime in the next 72-96 hours. This may not happen, but if it doesn't, I will be surprised. When this happens, all public gathering will be cancelled for 10 days.
- I suggest all of us avoid public gatherings. Outdoor activities are not as likely to lead to infection. It is contained areas and close contact that are the biggest risk.
- Tamiflu is running out. There is a national stockpile, but it will have to be carefully managed, as it is not enough to treat the likely number of infections when this is full-blown. I don't think there is a big supply of Relenza, but I do not know those numbers. If I had to choose, I would take Relenza, as I think it gets more drug to the affected tissue than Tamiflu.
- You should avoid going to the ER if you think you have been exposed or are symptomatic. ER's south of here are becoming overwhelmed -- and I mean that -- already. It is coming in waves, but the waves are getting bigger.
- It appears that this flu produces a distinctive "hoarseness" in many victims. The symptoms, in general, match other flu's; namely, sore throat, body aches, headache, cough, and fever. Some have all these symptoms, while others may have only one or two.

Okie dokie. And here I was just planning a trip tomorrow to Target and Petsmart. Contemplating life as if it were just an over reaction and it was time to have fun. See what TV does to you?!

Needless to say, we're not going shopping. Suddenly the great outdoors sounds greater than ever. That and cable.

Today there was swings:






Swimming in the spa, and snacks.


I also finished a video for work, let me know if you find it compelling. It's supposed to be compelling but it's tough to get opinions here in the isolation ward.

Welcome to swine flu Quarantine - Day 2

(Beautiful trees grandpa photographed below the dam)

Well, day two of the swine flu quarantine went well, apparently.


I say apparently because I had to leave to go to work all day, and left the children with my step mom and dad, and Daddy.


Wah. I miss all the good quarantine fun!

Let me tell you, they had a blast. I'm beginning to think we should rename this the swell flu quarantine.

There was a nice long walk along the dam, swimming in the spa, and bar-b-que.

Quite the pah-tee. (Mireya in Grandpa's GB hat)





Below is last week's crib notes, which ran in the Herald - Zeitung, an ironic foretelling of the week ahead...

Oh, and Mireya ended up with salmonella poisoning. I don't know where she got it from, we think a hot dog or pork chop, but in my frenzy/horror I threw out all the cutting boards except for one in the very back of the cabinet we hadn't used in a year.

Because in Comal county we specialize in over reacting. =:o

Share and Share Alike.

I have worked pretty hard to make sure my kids learn one important rule in life – share with others. This week I realized I went overboard. I should have placed some limits on this whole sharing bit, because now we’re all sharing the same cold.

This is despite a sneeze/cough/washing regiment that would put most hospitals to shame. But the air was just seeping with germs and it was just a matter of time before the invisible broke through the elbow sneeze rule and antibacterial soap defenses.

“Oh my God, I feel awful,” Mireya moaned. We concurred.

There is one upside to sharing a cold. It’s the found time.

Found time is that time you get unexpectedly in life, like a weird bonus round or overtime game. Time that normally would be spent trapped in traffic in the parking lot of the Friday night game, but is instead back on the field - where everyone in the stands is biting their nails until the end. It’s the time you never imagined you’d have because you had everything figured out well in advance, for weeks or months at a time.

Then you catch a cold and all bets are off.

The cold we shared gave us several hours of found time. Gone were the ambitious weekend plans, gone was school and work, and in their place, between naps and sniffles, was a little found time.

In one hour of found time we went outside and did chalk outlines. There we discovered our new puppy, Roxie, loves to bite at the chalk, particularly green, which made outlining her more challenging than anticipated.

Then Mireya, tissue in one hand and chalk in the other, grew a chalk garden, complete with sun and four types of flowers.

We tried chalk tinting on the puppy, but she was uncooperative. Roxie doesn’t like chalk THAT much, apparently.

(The best part of having a small dog is the really cool costumes. Grammy made this one)

In another round of found time (after naps and juice) we read every library book we had on hand and go through our unread magazines. We vowed to do at least five of the crafts – when we’re feeling better and can schedule time.

Nothing earth shattering happened in our found time. It had that precious quality of simply being there time, where you don’t save the world, don’t learn new things, don’t achieve greatness. We just got to be.

That was time worth finding – and sharing.